Mind Blown! My Audience Shares How THEY Regulate Their Nervous Systems

Maybe it's just me, but I am continually blown away by the wisdom that comes out of my listeners' mouths.

In this conversation, I invited a few of my listeners to join me on stage to share their personal practices for regulating their nervous systems. 

The Noom Vibe community is (in my opinion) the BEST, most positive and supportive crew in all the social spaces. In today's episode, you'll hear real people, sharing valuable tips and practices you can use today!

You'll also learn:

🧠  How your nervous system influences how you think, feel, perceive, react, and heal 

🚨  How your body prioritizes protection over growth when stuck in survival mode and how connection, creativity, healing, clear thinking, and emotional regulation take a back seat

🌞 How a dysregulated nervous system becomes more sensitive to stress. Just as a sunburn makes even a light touch painful, an activated nervous system can make minor stressors feel overwhelming.

💡 Why a regulated nervous system gives you access to your best self - clearer thinking, effective communication, better decision making and emotional regulation

🌱 Why nervous system regulation is the foundation of healing and why a safe body creates the space for self-healing practices to work more effectively and sustainably

For FREE Resources, 📖 Book Link, 📝 Quizzes, 👚 Self-Love Merch Shop, 🗣️ 1:1 Mentoring and more: https://www.linktr.ee/kristenbrownauthor

Thank you for being here! If you're enjoying this podcast, we'd super appreciate if you left us a 5 star rating and review.

Much Love,

KB 🦋

Transcript

Kristen 0:00

Hello, hello everyone, and welcome to Self-Healing with KB, where we strengthen the most important relationship we will ever have: the one with ourselves. Because no relationship will impact your life more than the one you have with you. Today we are talking about nervous system regulation, which is one of the most important healing practices we can have, because our nervous system influences nearly everything. It influences the way we think, the way we feel, our physical health, what we perceive, and what we actually do or do not do. And when our nervous system is stuck in survival mode, our body prioritizes protection over growth, over connection, over inner healing, over our creativity, over clear thinking, over our problem solving. When our nervous system is stuck, it's like everything just kind of shuts down. What I just heard in my mind, my mind's eye, was like when someone turns off a big machine and you hear it go, ooh, we kind of turn down. You know what I'm saying? Think of a movie. That's what I pictured my head. Everything shuts down. Thanks, Michelle. You always get me, girl. Everything shuts down. And then we're left just sort of managing life. We're just managing, we're running from thing to thing to thing to thing. And this is something that, of course, I've had my personal experience in both sides of this river, but also since learning more about it and researching it more, I really pay attention to my nervous system now more than I ever have. And here's something that's shocking. How do I word this? Um, you guys know that I've had like extreme, extreme anxiety, okay? And I've healed that and I worked with that, that's gone. I believe, I'm still looking into this within myself. I believe that I have always run on a kind of a lower-level vibrational hum of nervous system dysregulation. Just like this boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. Now, it's not to the effect that it has stopped my life or stopped me from making good choices and things like that, but it's kind of like you guys get it, thank you. It's kind of like this little, I don't even know how to describe it. This is again, I'm live, I'm saying this live for the first time. It's just something that I started noticing the more that I started working with my nervous system. Because I know I love my meditation, it keeps me calm, it keeps me in flow, it allows me to move freely and easily through my life. Yes, yes, yes, all of those things. And I noticed sometimes when I get quiet, there's this little. And I can notice it by maybe sitting at dinner with friends and my leg is moving. You know how you cross your legs and then you move your leg back and forth? And I'll notice something like that. I'm like, Kristen, are you in a hurry? Are you nervous about something? Are you thinking about something? It'll show up in things like that, or I'm kind of like in a hurry. I'm like, I gotta go, come on, we gotta go, we gotta go. And even though we're on time and whatever, I feel like that. I gotta get to the place, I gotta do the thing. It's just these little tiny ways that have shown up. Now, I believe I've become more adept at noticing those because I have worked so long at regulating my nervous system. Again, it started organically when I was trying to at least stop my chronic anxiety. But over time, because I have been at the high high and I have been at the low low where it's completely regulated, I can notice now that there's a little bit of a continuum, if you will. Let's look at it as a scale of one to 10. 10 was that high anxiety where my body was just flipping out. And let's say one, or let's say zero is no anxiety whatsoever, no nerves whatsoever, complete regulation. I could be running it sometimes like a three or a four, and it's totally not impacting my life, but I can feel it. And sometimes, this is interesting because I love this stuff. You guys know me, I'm like the complete geek and nerd about this stuff. I'm laying in bed at night, had a great day. Nothing went wrong. And I'm laying bed and I can feel my like my heart. And I'm like, okay, I just got into bed, so I've been moving and it needs to acclimate to now I'm laying down. Okay, get that. And that sometimes happens, and sometimes it doesn't. And I'm like, what is going on? Oh, I had dark chocolate, okay, that's what it is. Or oh, I had caffeine a little bit too late. That's what it is. But sometimes it's not that sometimes it's just this kind of feeling, and I'm like, KB, KB, what is going on? And so I have been really paying attention to trying to keep my nervous system regulated all throughout the day. I am a work in progress, I continue to learn. You know, this entire healing journey for me, y'all, has been so interesting because at each phase, innocently, I thought I did it. I thought I'm done. Oh, okay, I I figured out this. Or I don't have anxiety, so I cracked the code on nervous system regulation. No, there were layers and nuances and things that I just was not aware of yet. And so I would just tell you, I don't even know when. I just know that it was one night in this past seven days, could have been even less, like four or five days, I don't really keep track. Where I was like, girl, you feel like you're in a rush again. And that's something that I have noticed about myself is the rushing. Now, to know me, you probably wouldn't see it, to be honest with you. I'm a very casual person. I'm only rushing when I have to rush, but there's this rush that's going on inside of me that nobody knows because it doesn't look like, oh my God, get here, grab this, do this. We gotta hurry. Ha ha ha. Like all day long. It doesn't look like that. Michelle, do you relate? Because you're clapping. I'm wondering if you relate to that. Okay. Somebody else, too. Let me see who. Sandy and Michelle completely relate to that. Okay. Thanks, girls. But like I said, if you were around me, you wouldn't know that. And this is not constant, it's not all the time. So I've started to pay attention to that because I know how incredibly important nervous system regulation is now, at this stage of my game. Because I didn't know it when I was growing up. I didn't even know that I was dysregulated. It really wasn't until my tsunami happened and the anxiety hit like a crazy person. And here's another little thought I just want to add to this as well, you guys, is that sometimes when we go through something pretty cray, where it just rocked our world that was traumatic, that can stick with us even when the event is gone. Even when the circumstances is over, that can stay with us because it stores in our body. The amygdala picks that up and says, Oh my God, do not relax. Because it's also because we haven't relaxed for like, I don't know. It depends how long your thing lasted. But for me, my body got used to feeling a certain way, and it was so threatened because the well-being of myself and my children was threatened. Like that was an unbeknownst worst fear for me. Okay, I didn't walk around fearing that happening in my life, never, until it happened. And then I was like, oh MG. So I got into that space, or my body put me into that space, and it stayed there. It freaking stayed there. And that was difficult for me because I was like, okay, I'm at my mom's house. We're all safe. We're so loved. If you guys knew my parents, I mean, like beautiful scenario. Okay. My mom and my stepfather. And when I say my parents, my dad's in my life too, but he lived somewhere else. But anyway, very, very loving, supportive, safe, big house, food galore. Okay, I could have lived there my whole life. Okay, they would have never kicked us out. And because that's what I call it. I call it panting energy. Because I was stuck. I was stuck in a situation that happened. One of you is really relating to this right now. I'm intuitively picking this up because my eyes just teared up. And that's telling me that one of you has just teared up. I've learned to recognize that sign. You don't have to tell me who you are. You don't have to send up emojis. You don't have to do anything. I'm just telling you that I'm glad you're here. That's what I want you to know. I'm glad you're here. Because when I give my talks, I'm out, I always say to myself, this little prayer, I'm like, if this reaches one person, one sentence, one word reaches one person, then I've done my job. If you're here, I want you to, if you have, if you can, I want you to click in. I want you to just relax for a second and say, My God, this is this is exactly what I need to hear right now. There's nothing else I need to do. This is universe working for me. This is it. Okay. So I do have some people that who have joined the queue. I want to get through this opener first, and then we're going to open up the floor to all of you. It won't be long, so just hang out, guys. So when our nervous system is regulated, we have access to our best self, to our highest thinking, to the best problem-solving skills, and to our intuition. And that's really my favorite thing because I like to use my connection with source energy for everything, for everything. It's like, oh boy, this is happening. Show me what to do, guide me, be in my heart, channel through me if you need to in this particular situation, whatever. But that can't happen when our nervous system is wonky, when it's up-ended. We think more clearly, we respond rather than react. We communicate more effectively, we make better decisions, and we recover more quickly from stress. And this is important not only because we're all gonna have stressors in our life. Things just happen. It's just the way it is, it's part of the human design. It's part of the design here of this journey on earth. Okay, there's gonna those things are gonna happen. We can't stop those, but we can definitely learn how to move through them more effectively. We're also able to handle those big emotions better. And you guys know those emotions I'm talking about, those big ones that come in and feel like they're drowning you and completely enveloping you, and you don't feel like you can move. Guess what happens when our nervous system is regulated? We feel those, but they're not as all-consuming. I guess is the better way. Yeah, I could say it. Our relationships improve, our sleep becomes better and more restorative, and the body can devote more energy to repair. That's huge. Another thing that I learned, and why I try to really stay active in my, you know, present with my nervous system, is because I want my body to be functioning at its absolute optimal best. And it just simply can't if we are running in fight flight. It just can't. It's not the way that we are designed because the brain is like, there's some big trouble right now. I gotta send all my blood, all the blood to the limbs because you're gonna get ready to run from this T-Rex or this headhunter, I'm thinking of Gilligan's Island, that has that spear and aiming for you because this is all reptilian. This is all that archaic mind from back in the day. So it's not going to the things, the systems that it needs. You know, as I'm getting older in life, I'm like, I want a lot of energy to go to my healing body. I want a lot of energy to go to my healing body. So many people try to quote, heal themselves by different modalities. Okay, there's so many modalities. And I'm down for all of them, you guys. I'm down for all of them. There's just more that keeps coming up and coming up and coming up. And I hear people that are having such great experiences, and I'm like, right on. However, if the nervous system remains dysregulated, then those changes that we might experience momentarily will not absorb and they are difficult to sustain. So it's kind of like we're on a hamster on a wheel, we're doing doing the same thing over and over again, but nothing's sticking. And then we're like, this didn't work for me. So one of the things I've told you guys this before, but when I work with clients, immediately I prescribe them a meditation practice. The ones who do it regularly, boom, boom, boom, boom. The ones who don't, they stay stuck. I know that sounds strange, but it's the truth. There is people that I have coached for years that literally have stayed stuck. It's like three years later, I'm still saying the same things that I was saying. And then there's people, I kid you not, two, three, four, five times, boom, their life takes off. Because they have a regulated nervous system. So incredibly important. So regulating it keeps actually creates the internal conditions to make healing possible. It's not the entire healing journey, but I'm gonna tell you from me, my expert perspective is that it is the foundation that allows the healing to take root. And when our nervous system feels safe, our mind and body begin to heal. When it doesn't feel safe, much of our energy is spent simply trying to survive. And this is why I believe that learning to regulate our nervous system isn't just a wellness practice, it's not a trend, you all. It is something that I believe should be taught in our youth and it should become a life skill. We've got Julie coming up. Welcome, Julie. Thank you for allowing me to unpack that opener.

Julie 15:00

Yeah, I uh agree with you about the nervous system and that it does actually uh the system opens up um your your veins, your arteries to get the blood round, to get the chemicals round, so that you have the adrenaline in your body to make an escape. So the heart does pump faster, it is all every system in your body is connected to this nervous system. So to be able to hold it down, to be able to calm it, you have to pop it across to what they call the rest and digest state. Yes. Um the way that I do that, I if I'm in a room, I will look for three things that are the colour green. Um, I will look for sounds, I will listen for sounds, you know, to say, oh, I can hear a bird singing or the kettle's on, or I can hear footsteps, or whatever. I'm just gonna say senses. I use all of my senses to ground myself in the moment. And then when I'm in that moment, I tell myself I'm safe. It doesn't matter where I am, I could be in a bus stop. And I have been in a bus stop. I've been on a bench in the middle of the night in the freezing cold, and still I've been able to bring myself to a space of peacefulness that then clocks that uh system over because it's all ran, which is very, very strange for me to say, but it is all ran by thought. It's run completely by thought. Yeah, the story that we tell ourselves is so immensely important to check out, you know, bringing it back to your talk yesterday. We tell ourselves that things are happening or we're in danger, and then that system explodes and it becomes almost too big for our little bodies to cope with. We don't know what to do with it, we don't know what to do with this energy, we don't know how to solve anything when we're in that state. We are receiving, we're not in the driving seat. You know, when you're thinking about protecting yourself, your family, your children, you're then absolutely embroiled in what's going on rather than the things you can do, rather than the action or the response that you can take. So you have to switch yourself over to that rest and digest state for those answers to come in. For the answers to come in instead of what's going on, you're allowing options, choices, different kinds of perspectives, if you like. But you have to get into that state first, and it's a switch. And I think the best switch there is is to realize that you are safe right where you are. Ground yourself, spy five things beginning with G. You know, anything you want to do, even a bit of comedy in there is fun, you know. Oh, look at my socks, I've got stripey socks on today, and I look at the like the wicked witch, the West. Anything that takes your mind off what you are telling yourself about the danger.

Kristen 18:16

Yes, I have a question for you, Jules, if you want to come back. Yeah, I'd love to. Okay. I would love for Julie to come back because what I want people to hear is what it feels like pre-nervous system regulating and what it feels like post-nervous system regulation. Like, how has your life changed? What have you noticed about yourself? Anything you want to share, Julie?

Julie 18:44

I think the thing for me that I noticed was that I was uncomfortable physically.

Kristen 18:50

Ooh, before.

Julie 18:52

That was the first thing that I noticed. The second thing that I noticed was my lack of control of it. So I had this feeling, I didn't know what to do with it, and it was it's it was making me exhausted, really tired, brain-wise, body-wise, everything was just so and I felt weak. You know, it absolutely drained me. And when I noticed that, I said, I don't want to feel like this, I don't want this. This is not the thing that I want in my life. I don't want to travel through life constantly coming back to this point.

Kristen 19:33

Did you know it was a dysregulated nervous system that was causing it at that point, or did you just start to investigate why you feel that way?

Julie 19:43

Yeah, I did. Um, I've always been into biology in a massive way, human biology. And I always knew that everything worked together. So I kind of connected the feeling and the thoughts, and then the feelings, and then the thoughts, and they they they interact with each other all of the time. So they go, they're cyclic, so that one can feed the other, basically. So your body's nervous, and it says you'll bring to your brain, there's something to be nervous about. I'm nervous, and then your brain says, Yeah, you're nervous, there's something to be nervous about, and it just builds. So I had to come to a space where I could put a breaker in. So it's a stop sign for me. That's the first thing I did when I started to feel that way. I realized I didn't want to, so I had to use the imagination of a huge stop sign. Stop, and then that allowed me then to go work from that point. What am I stopping? I'm stopping the thoughts because the thoughts are feeding the feelings. All right, so I'm gonna put a breaker in there now and say no, so it's stop and then no, and then I can look for something else. Um, I think my course in hypnotherapy, I started that in 2021. I'm still doing it, which is great, because you never stop, you never stop finding new pieces of information to put in your puzzle, you know. That was so cool. I think the mindfulness of that really helped, and also the information between um the body functions and the rest and digest and the nervous state. It was just I got pieces of the puzzle slowly. It was never overnight. I didn't just go, right, you're all right now, and I still work with it today. So, what happens in nervous moments today, and now I start to regulate, because I can recognize certain signs like a pit feeling in my stomach, and then I can recognize maybe some of the thoughts I'm having, i.e., this sounds very silly, but Bobby will go missing for five hours. He's a cat. Logically, he's a cat and he's going to go off for five hours and come back in his own time. And he's done it many, many times. But my brain says, no, he's under a hedge somewhere, and you've got to go and find him. And then you've got to explain to the onus what's happened to the cat. Then you've got to explain to the onus why it took so long for you to actually find the cat. This is the information, the thoughts that are coming in my brain. I don't own those thoughts. They pop in. Okay, they're pop in thoughts. My body reacts to those thoughts by becoming nervous, anxious, and then feeling stuck or or or just panicking. Check telling Brad, go check the cats. Have you seen the cats? You know, and it's it's still still happens to this day, but now I can start to recognize some of the things I'm thinking. Ah, that's a call to be, you know, for my nervous uh system to ramp up and get get fired up for a bit. Obviously, it's bored today, but now I can then come back to that mindfulness that um I I kind of learned through that hypnotherapy course, which is brilliant, and I can tip it over. So I now there's no, there's two sides there's the fight, flight, action, worry, and then you've got the rest, digest, absorb, and see the options. That's that's basically where it comes from.

Kristen 23:25

Absolutely. Thank you. Brilliant, sis. Thank you for coming up with that contribution. Awesome. My favorite thing that Julie talked about, all of that was absolutely amazing. Like I was thinking she's co-hosting this show with me. That's why I call you guys co-hosts sometimes because uh you've you've been through some stuff, you learned some things, you get a little pile of wisdom. And I love when you come up and share with us. Your perspective matters, the way you say it matters. What I like is that she brought attention to the idea that the thoughts are what creates the nervous system dysregulation. Yes, it all starts there, you guys. It really and truly does. And something came up for me. Let me try to put my hand on it. Um oh, my body, my brain likes to look for problems when there isn't any. You know that old waiting for the other shoe to drop feeling? Yeah. Have you guys dealt with that? Let me see some emojis if you have. Yeah, so everything is calm, and when things are calm, my brain starts going, oh no, this there's a problem. Or a problem's going to come. Brace yourself, something's coming. I remember that in my youth. I so clearly, and like in my 20s, I remember feeling like it's really calm right now, something bad's gonna happen. And that is because when things were really calm, something bad did happen. Like coming home from school on a Friday, I think it was, or Monday, it was a Monday. Coming home from school on a Monday, and the neighbor kid was at the house and told me that my brother was in a car accident and he was in a coma. Boom, out of the blue. Calm life, everything's fine, and that's stored in me. So get through all those things, but then when it's calm, my brain goes, Oh, it's calm. That means something's coming. It's funny, I still work with this to this day. I still work with this because it still comes up for me. Like right now, my life is very calm, very calm, like eerily amazing. Everybody's doing so well mentally, physically, emotionally, relationship-wise, financially. Everybody's kicking booty right now. And my brain is like, oh boy, what's coming down the road. And so that's something that I work with. When that comes up, it doesn't come up all the time, but I've been working with that. And what what I've noticed is it's starting to dissipate, it's not coming up as much. Interesting. And that started for me probably when I was 11 years old. Julie said, absolutely spot on. I'm not used to this, I don't usually experience this without a dilemma, yeah, or a drama, right? That can happen. Okay, we have Sandy and then we have Jennifer. Really excited for you ladies to join me and share your little pieces of wisdom. Thank you for joining, Sandy. Hi. Hi, KB.

Sandy 26:27

How are you today? I'm doing good, thank you. So I feel like I have a PhD in my nervous system. Oh, let's hear it. So I was a child of the 60s. I was two months born two months early. And so from the start, my nervous system was not great. So as I grew up, I was on so many medications for I always was told you have a bad stomach. I was an anxious child that never was diagnosed as an anxious child. And so I took medication almost my whole life until I was living with um an acupuncturist as my um roommate, and I came home from work one day and I got I was doubled over. My stomach was going crazy. And she goes, Let me put a few needles in your ears. And my stomach relaxed. Wow. And that's when I realized it was nerves, it it was that's how my body was handling stress. Yes, and I had no clue until that moment, I it was like an aha moment. I'm like, oh my god, I don't have a bad stomach. My body's not handling stress well.

Kristen 27:45

Yes.

Kristen 27:47

And can I ask this question or actually add it?

Sandy 27:50

Sure.

Kristen 27:51

You sense, like you said, you were a preemie, and my God, being born two months early in the 60s, you're lucky to be here. You know what I'm saying? Sure. And um, but going up all that time with that activated nervous system, it probably felt normal to you. Like this is how you thought a person felt because you had never felt anything to the contrary.

Sandy 28:12

Correct. So I am 64 right now, Kristen, and I'm telling you, this is the first time in my life that my body, mind, everything is relaxed. First time.

Kristen 28:28

Let's see some emojis for this, you guys. I am tearing up. I'm tearing and cheering. Yeah, that's amazing, Sandy. Oh.

Sandy 28:36

So you just go, you know, you take doctors' words, you know, but they're wrong. Sometimes they're wrong. Sometimes. Sometimes they're wrong. You know, now I do. You know, I can control my nervous system by techniques I've learned over the past couple of years. Does it go haywire every so often? Yeah, it goes cray cray when things go, but I can bring myself back so much faster. It's not a week of that. It may be a day, it may be an afternoon, maybe an hour, but I know it's gonna come back soon.

Kristen 29:13

Can you teach us some of your techniques?

Sandy 29:17

So I do this thing where, sort of like Julie, where um let's say at work, for instance, I'm stressed, I'll go outside in nature and I'll just look around. What do I see? What do I smell? What do I hear? I try to change all my senses. I always have a little container of vanilla in my bag because smells. Smells change it.

Julie 29:44

Wow.

Sandy 29:45

I love when if I if I get in bed at night and I'm feeling that, you know that restless feeling. I have a bag of ice in my freezer, I grab it and I just put it on my chest.

Kristen 29:58

Ooh, that's good too.

Sandy 30:00

To calm my nervous system down. Like I started a bedtime routine where all electronics are off, I light a candle an hour before bed so no lights are on in my home. Just to create that calm, quiet, bring it down a notch. Even if I'm not anxious, I do it all the time. Just because it feels good to me. What else do I do?

Kristen 30:26

Those are excellent rec recommendations. There really are. The bag of ice on your chest, I've not heard before. I've heard holding a high ice in your hands, but not on your chest.

Sandy 30:37

Right? Then sometimes in the middle of the night, if I can't sleep, whatever it is, I'll go do grounding. I'll just go for like a five-minute walk outside. Good for you. You know, I'll just go. You know what? I have this energy stored in me. I don't know why. Doesn't really matter. I'm gonna get rid of it.

Kristen 30:58

Yes, because I can. Because I can. Yes. I don't know about you guys, but I am ah I have so many feels about this. I have so many feels about this for both Julie and for Sandy. But you guys have heard this is a person who has had chronic nervous system issues, anxiety, if you will, her whole entire life. The doctors told her that it well, she just has a bad stomach. And then she experienced what it felt like not to have it, and she realized, you know what, this isn't just a bad stomach. I have nervous system issues, and she advocates for herself. She has become her own best caregiver, and she knows this is what I do to get myself regulated. Oh, I love that so much. So good. Okay, Jennifer. It's been a minute, Jennifer. So glad that you are here. I know you dip in and out, and you are perfectly allowed to do so, but we're happy you're here now. Thank you so much.

Jennifer 32:00

I am so um just edified that you remember me, Kristen. Thank you. Oh, I adore you. I'm so glad you're here. Well, I adore you too. I know actions probably speak louder than words, but I what can I say? I get crazy, and uh part of the way, you know, to get straight to your point, part of the way that I manage my anxiety is is I really have to do what I know I can do at that time. And and so I I appreciate golly, I love the um variety of what I always get when I do pop in here. Your fresh, bright window that opens to us, Kristen, and you've always been through these things, so you relate, and I I know every time I hear you talk, I feel safe. I feel extremely safe, and I I have a place that I can I can be in that space. And then Julie, every time I hear her, I get so much great information. Like I can't write fast enough. And I mean, you get a lot of good concrete science stuff, you know. And then Sandy, thank you so much for your transparency that this started at childhood because you just turned on my light. I was diagnosed with anxiety when I was about, if I remember correctly, about the fifth grade. Wow, yeah, and I I remember this so well. You know, I mean, I'm just gonna, I'm just saying, I'm I'm pretty smart kid. I mean, I made great grades. I was a pretty smart kid, and and very much a perfectionist, and and I gleaned that from my lovely mother who not only attempted, but in my eyes, she did do everything perfectly, and I wanted to be just like her, and there was no way that was ever gonna happen because God did not make me like her or anybody else. But um the doctor prescribed a little, I'll never forget this, it was just teeny tiny, it looked like a little dot, that those little candy dots. It was a little green nerve pill. Well, it just made me want to sleep all the time, and and I I couldn't take it. I I literally fell asleep all the time. So my mom took me off of that, and we didn't go back there. But you know, all my life, you know, you have highly functioning alcoholics, you have really highly functioning drug addicts. I've always been a very highly functioning anxiety uh geek. Yep, super highly functioning, and I could turn that into excitement, but I let it go, you know, and I I've been in and out of counseling a lot at different times in my life because I really believe in good counsel. I think this show offers good counsel, and I think a wise person seeks much counsel. So that brings me to how do you deal with it? Was your question. I have been able to create a toolbox over these years and through so much trauma, so much trauma. I mean, especially over like the last four years of my life, and I've shared some of that in this platform before, through a daughter that we found out was alcoholic, and we had to go rescue her from another state, bring her home, her fighting the whole way, and it was way worse than we ever thought. And there was my beautiful little brown head-headed, brown-eyed girl that was just in so much trouble, and and over the next couple of years got so sick, we could have lost her very easily. Now she's recovering, two and a half years, and about to get married. But you know, um, through these traumas, through the anxiety, through the counseling, through my church, my faith, through friends who thank God are real. I have real friends in my life that I have real people in my life that have been through real crap and are not afraid to share it and have come along beside of me. So, one of the ways that I have gotten through my anxiety and dealt with it is latching on to those friendships and going to them and not being ashamed to be real. I've put that in my tool belt big time. The 12-step program for me, and I know I've heard others share.

Kristen 36:44

Come back, come back, Jennifer. Let's see, she hasn't popped up yet, but on this side, but I would love to. Yeah, there we go. Okay, we're gonna have her finish this because she's on to something here. The 12-step program. Yes, something big about this. Okay, I hear it coming.

Jennifer 37:00

Five minutes sure does go by fast. Uh, but the 12 steps has been a game changer for me. And if I had my way, and I never well, I never will, I would put it in every junior high school as part of uh part of that for me has been knowing what to let go, you know. So, okay, here's here's a concrete example. Uh Julie talked about pieces of the puzzle. I love how she uses I I put this with my puzzle. I've got my puzzle, and I this was another piece. I've never pictured my recovery from anxiety and wanting to fix everyone, which is what has caused my anxiety and be perfect. It hasn't been a puzzle, but it has been a tool belt, and I literally can see this belt around my waist. But so I just had knee replacement, Kristen, and um, and I'm four weeks in doing great, thank goodness, just really doing great. Great doctor, great physical therapy. But I like to be busy. I love to garden this spring. We've had good rain here in Tennessee, perfect time for a garden. But for me, not to get anxious, not to suffer from anxiety, and then pull the people that I love into that craziness with me, yeah, I let the garden go. I I mean, honestly, it is killing me. I want so much right now to be tending to my vegetables and this and that. So before I had knee surgery, I planted three pretty little pots of flowers and I put them on my side porch that only has two steps that I knew I could get to, and I could tend to my garden, if you will. And it it had to be knee surgery. I have to focus on my physical health right now. That is a part of me focusing on my anxiety. So I guess all that to say is I have to take an honest inventory of what is important here. How important is it? And that that part of treating my anxiety, it it applies to certain kinds of anxiety, you know, like for me, what was coming up. But then the kind of anxiety I had when my daughter came home and the world went absolutely out of control, that was where I had to tap into um, okay, what what what can you actually do here? Jennifer, you cannot save her, you cannot make her go into rehab. But what, you know, I had a real long list of what I could not do, and I had to accept that and getting an element helped. But then I could say, but what can I do? And that involved me setting some boundaries to protect me and to protect her here in our home. It's like, what can I do? What can I not do? And stick with that. You know, I I think different kinds of anxiety call for different methods. And I've had every kind of anxiety, I think, in my life. The most recent one, my son being diagnosed as a heart failure patient, my 37-year-old boy. Wow. So, yeah, so here we are again. Here I am again. Sometimes I'm like, God, what the heck?

Kristen 40:23

Yeah.

Jennifer 40:24

Uh, and and and I went through this whirlwind when we got that diagnosis right before Christmas. Kristen, I thought I was absolutely just gonna like disintegrate. And I I had to pull it together, I had to make a few extra meetings because those 12 steps apply to every area of your life. And and I had to walk through in my mind with myself and my group, what can I do? Again, I cannot fix him. I can support him, I can pray for him, I can take him and his lovely wife a meal, I can invite them over and treat them to a night out. There's a lot here that I have no control over.

Kristen 41:08

Yeah.

Jennifer 41:08

And I've come a long way with my anxiety. I do have anxiety disorder, but it is, it is a I'm in recovery for that. It is a day by day learning and cleaning and building up my little tool belt.

Kristen 41:22

That's right. Oh my gosh. Well, I'm sending so much love to your daughter who's clean now, and also your son with his health issues for you know, just I will I will hold him in the highest light.

Jennifer 41:35

Thank you so much. That means that means everything. Yeah, I understand.

Kristen 41:41

Thank you, Jennifer. Wow, you guys, you know, sometimes I'm just like, why am I continuing to be blown away every time I have these conversations and you guys come up? I don't know. It's just like this has been so far one of my favorite conversations, to be truthful. You guys are really showing up and just delivering it. I was not going to put this on my podcast, but I think I'm going to. All right, I want to just list a couple of techniques first before I bring up my next guest. Some of my techniques, and this is why I wanted you all to share yours because there are there's so many. We heard about ice on your chest from Sandy. I've heard about holding ice in your hands, and I've used that with my daughter when she was spinning out one day. But on your chest, oh my gosh, there's so many cool things. So we've already talked about practicing presence. That's one of my biggest ones for me is practicing presence. And this is to literally root myself into right now. Right now, not past, not future, right now. So this could be when I'm feeling anxiety or I'm a little bit of nerves and I'm going to take a shower. And I'm in there and I can think and think and think and be nervous the whole time I'm in there, or I can say, what does the temperature of the water feel like? What does this salt scrub feel like on your skin? Are you cold anywhere? You see what I'm saying? Or being very, very present with shaving my legs. What I have learned repeatedly is being present, it like instantaneously takes me out of anxiety. It's wild. That's because we're not in the past, we're not in the future, where the thoughts are that are creating the emotions. Another one things that I do in the presence mode is I ask myself what my feet are doing and how they feel. Are they cold? Are they making noise? Are they walking on a sidewalk or on gravel? What are my feet doing? Even if I'm just laying on the couch and I have my tennis shoes on, I'm like, what do my feet feel like right now? I also give my mind permission to stop thinking and stop trying to solve and be present now. I will say to myself, Kristen, or brain, or however I word it at the moment. It's okay to stop thinking about this. You have permission to put this on the shelf for a little while. And you guys, I'll be thinking about things that aren't even like a pressing issue. But it's going right and I give myself permission to stop thinking. Just putting this away for now. This is how I taught myself to sleep during my tsunami when I couldn't sleep, is I told my brain, I can't solve any of these problems right now. So, brain, these are gonna be here in the morning when I wake up and I will revisit them then. But right now, I'm putting them aside. Boom, fell asleep, and I stopped having sleep issues through my tsunami. I know it's crazy, but that's what worked for me. I also notice my pets. This is sad to say, but when I'm stressed or I'm overthinking, I'll walk right by my pets. They'll be sitting there looking at me and wanting attention. And trust me, they are not neglected. Just so you guys know, I'm probably hypersensitive to this, but I will stop, even if I'm in a hurry. Because beans will be standing on the counter. I'm like, oh, beans, you're looking at me. Oh, and she'll start meowing and walking around. And you know, I'll just take the time to interact with my pets. Uh, breathing techniques, I won't go super long into all of these things that I'm talking about, but breathing techniques where I'll do long, deep inhales and exhales. I'll inhale as long as I can, I'll hold it, and I'll exhale as long as I can. And these lengthen as I do it. So they might feel very short in the beginning. That's I'm like, yep, I needed to do this because these inhales are very short and my exhales are very short. But then as I do it, that's my sign that I need to do it. But as my as it goes on, they become really long and really extended. Box breathing is my new favorite, and also just laying still and paying attention to my breath. Again, that's a presence. I'm also a big fan of putting on 432 Hertz bineural beats while I'm working. So instead of sitting in a quiet house, I'll put that on in the background. On my computer on YouTube, I have a channel that I like. And if you play around with bineural beats, everyone, please know they're not all created equal. Find something that works for you. If you put something on, you're like, ew. Because I put on some sounds sometimes where I'm like, this is irritating me. That's okay. Let me go find another one. Meditation. I think Jennifer just said on the back channel she wanted to mention meditation. Yeah, I wanted to mention that I meditate on my A to Z of praise. That's great. My list is different every time. That's that's really cool, you guys. That's like that is very cool. Sandy said, Have you ever sung a word in different ways? In a fun way. I have. I have, but that's a great thing too. That's I love that. Um, meditation is another thing that I do. I do all kinds of meditation practices. I always end my day with a meditation while I'm laying in bed. I'll allow myself to free think for a while because sometimes that's the only time in my day that I actually just get to be with me in my thoughts. So I'll allow myself some free thinking time and then I go to meditate. Sometimes it's a mantra, I'll just repeat a mantra, all is well. I am loved, or I am love. That's another one. Clear and center. This is one of my old faithfuls that I started 15 years ago, clear and center. I imagine clearing out the clutter and pulling back into my heart. So meditation, yes, and I definitely try to meditate every day. And here's one of my favorites, and um Jennifer spoke on this is this I connect with source. I talk to God because knowing that I have universal intelligence on my side keeps me regulated. It reminds me that everything is purposeful, even the challenges, and that it they're designed for me to grow in some way. I ask for guidance and I just keep that dialogue open. I started this 15 years ago during my tsunami and let this practice wane. I did. And then I've started it back up again. I'm like, what am I doing? I know this. Well, you know, life gets busy, you guys. We get pulled in many different directions. So now I am reconnecting with that guidance all day long, every single day, talking to source, just like I have a best friend standing next to me. And of course, gratitude. Gratitude is huge. Gratitude is a huge, I mean, it is, by the way, one of the highest vibrational frequencies that we can be in. Absolutely. This is known. Gratitude from some of the greatest researchers and scientists in the world. Gratitude is one of the highest vibrational frequencies. Also, love and freedom, um, appreciation, those type of things. And when we get into gratitude, we can't be in fear. We can't be in what ifing the future? We can't be ruminating on the past. We are right now. All right, Sandy said something else that I crossed the screen, but I want to read it. Um, all the cells in my body are healthy and well. I love that. I've been doing that too. Somebody on TikTok recently had a little thing there who said, it was a tune. I forgot the tune. I did save the video. I need to go back to it. But the this guy was singing the tune, like the same words over and over again, saying, All the cells in my body are happy and healthy, or something like that. And it had he had this little tune to it. He was just singing around dancing, and I was like, That's great, you guys. Sing and dance to these mantras as well. Um, let's see. Anybody else message me? No. And we are going to bring up first we have truth, and then we have a money. So, truth, welcome, welcome. Hey, Kristen. Good day to you.

Truth 49:53

Good day. I love what everybody has said, and pretty much everything that everyone has said, I've used at some point. So I'll try to bring in some different aspects. Um, one thing I do want to go back to though, is can't remember who was talking about it, um, with the smells and different things, but that was one of the first things that I learned that helped me going into the outside world, dealing with other people, was to have a physical. It was my um emotional safety kit, which included a crystal that I could like hold in my hands and feel and look at to bring me back to presence. And then I always have like either lavender or rosemary eucalyptus, because those are my safe smells. So have that.

Kristen 50:48

Um, and then making sure essential oils, you're meaning.

Truth 50:52

Oh, yes, essential oils for the smells. Um and then a photo of something that makes me happy and makes me feel safe, which is like basically like the landscape of where I live. And then, you know, if I'm going into a challenging situation, changing it to my lock screen or having it somewhere that's super easy in my phone to get back to. So when I start to feel elevated, I can go back to that because one of my favorite things is sitting on my porch and just looking at the beautiful view. I have a view of two table rocks and Mount McLaughlin and just fields. And I just sit there and I like watch the birds, and I have little videos on my phone of like the birds flying around and tweeting. And I also have videos of my phone of like oceans and creeks and places that I've actually been where I've felt serenity and peace. So just having like things like that to go back to. And when I'm out in the world, especially like working my events and stuff like that, all of those little things really help me come back to feeling grounded when I start to like float off into the world of anxiety. And yeah, so that was like monumental for me, and then also giving myself permission to step away, whether it's just like going to the bathroom or wherever it is, and breathing. And if I don't have the capacity to do some special type of breath work, then just like deep breath in and out and breathing in whatever it is that I need, love, light, comfort, acceptance, whatever those things are, and then breathing out all of the fear, the anxiety, the stress, the frustration, the hurt. And while I do it, as you were talking about, I feel my feet below me to like really like feel into being grounded. And let's see. Recently I've taken to coloring. I have an adult coloring book, not like weird or anything like that, just like a little, you know, more advanced than a kid's coloring book, where it's just like lots of like shapes and things to fill in, and mandalas and nature scenes and stuff like that. And I use colored pencil because I like the texture. I like the way that it feels in my hand against the paper versus a marker or versus a crayon. And I'm not, I've never really been very talented in drawing, but I really like to color. And then sometimes I end up like doodling. And I've also recently been doing a lot more singing. That's not, you know, like I'm not the most on-key person when it comes to singing. Um, so I think I've held back a lot in that, but now I just like stop being afraid and I'm singing along to my favorite songs. And I have like a great playlist on Spotify that I call the goddess mix of all of these amazing women that are just like really empowering music, and I'll sing and I'll dance to it, and it just feels so good. And then some of my music that really helps me the most, it's called a beautiful chorus. And they have a song about inner peace, and they have a song where they're saying, I am safe here, basically, like over and over, and these like beautiful tones, and I'll like sing that and put my hand on my heart and feel my feet. And like if I just go through that once, it's like the shift is just immediate because I'm activating all of the truth.

Kristen 54:34

So good. Those were all so good. And here's why, here's why I love this so much. She's talking about real time things. Where we're we're we're in public, we're at a wedding, we're at a dinner, we're at a reception, we're at a baby shower, we're somewhere real time. What are we gonna do? Can we really hit the meditation floor and just start doing all of our deep breathing? I mean, what do we do? And yes, we can excuse ourselves to the bathroom and do a couple of techniques, but there's things that you can do in the presence of people that may they may not even know. And what came to mind for me was tapping. Now, of course, we've got this full tapping script that we can do, right? I have heard, and I thought, oh, that's really great. That people, like let's say they're on a plane and they're getting nervous, they just take their fingers and they tap right underneath their collarbone. And they just, you guys hear me doing it? They just tap underneath their collarbone like this. Nobody knows what they're doing. Thank you, truth. I know that you do the work to regulate your nervous system. And I love all the things that you shared. And this is what I was hoping to get today from you guys is I can say the same things over and over again. This is what I use, but I want to hear from you because, again, there's so many options out there, and the key is to listen to yourself and to um switch things up and to do what feels right for you. That's important. And you know what's cool? I'm glad that truth brought up singing because I didn't realize how much singing does for me. I am a singing person, I am terrible. I oh my gosh, it's no, I don't have a singing voice at all. I mean, there's I can sing to maybe bad company, you know, which is a man. But um my point is that I sing all the time. And I noticed when I was really depressed and anxious, I wasn't singing. And I thought, there's something to all this, there is something here. Okay, we have Amani. Come on up, Amani. Share with us today. We're talking about how to regulate your nervous system, and everybody is sharing their practices.

Imani 56:51

Well, I am the next contestant on the prices right. All right, you are. I I loved everything that everyone has shared so far. And for me, I didn't like being, I didn't like not being in the quiet growing up after growing up after I was separated from my dad after I had been assaulted and had my kids I got from my mother. And she was working two and three jobs like she was before when I was with my dad. So she was never home. So her friend and her daughters would have to watch me, and they would never let me sit by myself, they would never leave me alone because they're like an idle mind is a devil's workshop. You could be thinking up something for leaving a room by yourself. I'm like, I want to be left alone. Wow. I'm just gonna be left alone, and so as that kept going into adulthood, I learned to not like being in the quiet, not being alone, because I had been told you shouldn't be by yourself. You're thinking idle thoughts, you're gonna be taken over by the devil. And it's like, no, that's not true. So going into relationships, I would do the same thing. I would just go from relationship to relationship to relationship and not give myself time to process the one I just got out of to even appreciate the new one. But now, oh, can I have solitude for a hundred, Alex, please? I like the solitude now. I like being in the stillness of the room because when all the things, all the outer forces are no longer being intrusive into your space and all the distractions have quieted down. I don't know about anyone else, but I feel a heightened sense of peace and stillness in solitude and just being right there in the present, in the here, in the now, not worrying about anything, anyone, anybody, just being. Because so often we allow ourselves to get caught up in the shuffle and bustle of life that we don't slow down. And our body's trying to tell us, hey, we need a break. Excuse me, excuse me. But I'm learning that it's okay to give myself permission and time to have a siesta time. And not always do I take a nap, but I am T nap. But in that siesta time, I give myself time to just be still. And that allows my other senses to be heightened, and so then I can hear the birds chirping on the tree outside. I can hear the traffic on the major highway right outside my apartments. I can notice things that I normally wouldn't notice because of all the other noise and distraction. I also like to dance it out. Yeah, you know, with my back props, I can't dance as well as I used to. But like they do on Grayson Avenue whenever they have like something bad happen or they're having a really tough day, you know, Meredith would get, you know, her friend Christina and they'd be like, Let's dance it out. And you just find some music that's really uplifting and you dance it out, and it's like shaking all the negativity off of you. That's what it works like to me when I'm dancing it out. I'm shuffling all the negativity off of me. Um, another thing is I come up with songs, and I'll just start singing these songs. And I'm like, okay, God, what is that?

Kristen 1:00:17

You know, do you make up your own songs, Amani? I make up my own jingles. I couldn't be a jingle writer. My husband laughs at me all the time. He's like, girl, you missed your calling.

Imani 1:00:28

Yeah, people say I miss being a comedian because they're like, Amani, you have no sense, you're out of control. You should be a comedian. I'm like, ah, no. But I'll just start singing songs of different types of gratitude. I'll replace lyrics of one song with something else, and that just brings joy to me. And also, there is nothing like a good massage.

Jennifer 1:00:55

Yes, I agree.

Imani 1:00:57

Just having a good massage or having a nice soaking bath with Epsom salt in it. I miss those because I can't get in the in the sh in the tub anymore like that. But I love those things. Anything that can just change the ambiance changes the tone and changes your feelings. And so it gives you permission to be like, you know what? Not my monkey, not my circus, not my problem. Am I really supposed to be holding on to this burden? Okay, no, I'm going to now let it go. And just feeling the weights lifted off of you when you're in that place of peace and solitude is like no other. Keep shining here.

Kristen 1:01:41

Thanks, Amani. She always lands that plane right at the perfect time. Oh, so good. I love everything that she brought up. Once again, these are all options, you guys. I started out this talk today talking about why it's so incredibly important to heal our nervous system and how it is part of one of the faculties of having a stellar relationship with yourself and how all relationships stem from the relationship we have with ourselves. So everything else that we're dealing out in the world has to do with how we are treating ourselves. And I went over how the nervous, why it's important to regulate the nervous system, what flight, what fight, fight, and freeze does to our bodies, how it helps us to handle our emotions better, improve our relationships, improve our sleep, and how it restores the body. The list goes on and on. This has been an absolute stellar conversation. I am blown away, but not surprised because I continually am blown away by you guys. But hey, I am just so grateful to have you all as co-hosts who come up and to share. And also for those of you who come up and ask questions, that's important too. But let me tell you something. When you put a lot of people together in a room that are high vibration like this, it really moves the needle in people's lives. So I just want to thank you all for taking the time to come up and to share. Julie, Sandy, Jennifer, Truth, and Amani. You guys are amazing. And everybody else who's just listening, sometimes you just want to listen. Doesn't mean you're not amazing. Okay? I get it. My hope for everybody is that this conversation today ignited a little fire or perhaps created a deeper awareness as to why we really want to regulate our nervous systems, how incredibly important it is to do so. And maybe you've learned a few techniques. Thank you so much for listening, everybody. You guys rock. Remember, you matter, you always have, and you have everything it takes to heal your life. Much love, everybody.